Tell Me No Lies (18 page)

"Morning." Hank threw her a lazy smile, and she wondered what it would be like to see that smile every morning.

"Coffee will be ready in a minute."

He helped himself to a cup and leaned against the counter, waiting for the drink to brew.

She peeked at him, then away. "I... I want to thank you for last night."

He nodded, studying her, and she felt the force of his gaze clear down to her toes

"Back on track now?" He looked... almost disappointed. Well, what did he expect? For her to fall apart and stay that way?

"It was very generous of you to stay, especially since I... since I behaved so badly."

"Not so bad." His eyes were soft. "Considering."

She didn't want to consider; she wanted to move on. Without softness, without him. She couldn't afford anything else. "Well, I appreciate it. But I'm fine now. I'm sure you have plenty to do. You don't have to stay "

His brows rose and that teasing glow lit up his green eyes. "You're throwing me out without breakfast?"

She struggled with politeness. "Of course not. I'm... I didn't mean... I'm sure we have some eggs." She opened the refrigerator and the contents blurred in front of her. "Sonya usually ..." She caught herself, and suddenly she was trembling again.

And like that, he was there, as though he knew, as though he understood. He shoved her gently aside, peered into the box, and took out a dozen eggs.

"I know there's cheese because I made a sandwich last night. How about an omelet?"

She shook her head. The headache had eased, but her stomach rebelled at the thought of food. "No really, I'm not hungry. But please, you go ahead."

She retreated as he took out three eggs and a slab of herbed cream cheese. She found him a mixing bowl and with those deft, capable fingers, he broke the eggs into it and whipped them with a wire whisk he discovered in a drawer. Pans hung from a rack over a central workstation, and he chose one, set it on the stove, turned up the heat, and dropped in a lump of butter to melt

She was amazed at how quickly he worked. Before she knew it the eggs were cooking. "You like to cook." It was more observation than question, a little discovery. He didn't seem the domestic type, and yet there he was, missing only the apron. It spoke to that other side of him, the one mat included Mandy and Rose and Apple House.

He didn't seem to think it so special. He shrugged "I like to eat. Unless you're going to depend on other people, one goes with the other."

By that time the coffee had finished brewing. She poured herserf a cup and eyed him over the rim. His big body filled her kitchen the way it had filled her bed. Roiled-up shirtsleeves exposed muscles in forearm and wrist that bunched and rippled as he worked. Again something stirred inside her. A longing for the touch of his hand, the warmth of his body.

It would be so easy to tell him everything. He would understand, he would help her. She felt the words on the edge of her mouth, the urge to share the burden so powerful.

And then he spoke. "Alex, if you can, tell me what happened when you came home yesterday."

This was her chance. If she could only open her mouth, get the words out Tell all. But she wavered, not wanting to relive those awful moments.

"I know you don't want to think about it, but we don't know what happened yet It looks like Sonya might have died from natural causes a heart attack or a stroke. Did she have a weak heart? Complain of dizziness?"

It wasn't her heart, Detective.
"She didn't complain about anything, but she did get confused a lot I always attributed it to the culture difference."

"She'd been here a long time, though, hadn't she? If your mother had brought her over."

Damn, why couldn't she keep the lies straight?

If she just told him the truth, she wouldn't have to.

"I guess some people never fully adjust."

He was looking at her closely, and she turned to the coffeepot, refreshing her cup to get out of his view.

"So, as far as you know, she had no medical history that might explain a collapse?"

Would a bout of torture and interrogation at the hands of the KGB count? She was sure it would; why couldn't she tell him so? Instead, she shook her head.

He jiggled the pan, redistributing the eggs, and turned to her, relaxing against the nearby counter as though he belonged there. Did he?

"It's probably nothing," he said, "but I want to make sure. Just in case something else went wrong, I'd like to know how you found her."

She loved him like this. The way his face turned sober, intent but humane.

"Did you touch her, pick her up?"

She thought back, trying not to let sorrow rip her apart. "I... I pulled her into my lap, tried to wake her..." Her voice caught.

"It's all right. Take your time. I know how hard this is."

She saw compassion in his face, imagined how he'd look when she'd told him everything. As if he could spin back time and make it all go away.

She took a ragged breath. Composed herself. "I tried to revive her. Unsuccessfully. I called an ambulance. The patrol car arrived. Then Lieutenant Parnell, then you."

"And when you first came in, when you first walked up to the kitchen door, did you notice anything unusual or out of place? Besides the obvious, that is. Anything at all?"

"Nothing. And even if there were, I was too distracted to notice."

He nodded thoughtfully. "Okay. Then we'll just have to wait and see what the coroner turns up."

He checked the pan again, then spread a generous spoonful of cheese in the center of the eggs, rolled one side over the other, and slid the omelet onto a plate.

"Sure you won't have some?"

She nodded, not even sure she could speak. Something huge quaked inside her. Aside from the people who'd been there all those years ago, she'd trusted no one with the whole truth. Now she was on the verge of altering the habits of half a lifetime, and it terrified her.

Don't do it.

Tell him.

Don't.

He poured himself a cup of coffee and pulled up a stool at the counter. Without thinking, she gave him a fork and a cloth napkin, and suddenly he was eating breakfast in her kitchen as if he did it every day. And despite herself, she liked it

"So, what are your plans?" He chomped down a forkful of eggs.

"Plans?"

"For the day. What are you going to do? I'm not going toi let you rattle around this house alone."

She blinked. Was she going to confess today? "I... I don't know. I haven't thought about it yet."

"Why not come back to the farm with me?"

The farm? That dream-filled place of apple blossoms? "I... no, I couldn't"

"If you won't come with me, let me take you to Lake-view. Whoever that guy is out there, you seemed pretty close to him. Let me take you to him. Or call him to come here."

Her heart nearly leaped out her throat. "What guy?"

He threw her a look: Don't con a Conner. "The man you met the night of your party."

Before she could think, she blurted, "How did you " Dawning horror rose in her voice. "You followed me." Her stomach cramped. He knew. He'd known all along. "You followed me."

"Who is he, Alex?" It was spoken quietly, but she heard the demand underneath. A cop's demand.

All the weakness of a moment ago, the compulsion to confess, the certainty that he would understand God in heaven, how close she'd come. The man was a cop after all; how could she ever forget that?

Her armor clanked into place. "I thought you were my friend."

"I
am. That's why "

"Friends don't spy on friends."

His eyes hardened. "Friends don't lie to friends either." He tossed a photograph on the counter. "You said you had no pictures of your mother."

Ice froze her veins. Sirens screamed in her head. "Where did you get that?"

He remained mute, the answer obvious.

"You came here pretending to comfort me, and all the while you used what happened to search my house? That's not only illegal, it's despicable."

He had the grace to look ashamed, but not enough to deny it. "I don't want to hurt you, Alex. God, you must know that If you're in some kind of trouble, I can help."

"Help? Is this the kind of help you give? Betrayal, lies? I don't need that kind of help."

His face turned white. "Maybe you don't." He pushed his plate away. "And maybe you do."

"No maybes about it." She tried to brush past him, but he grabbed her wrist and pulled her back.

"Who's the man out by the lake, Alex? What were you doing in Luka Kole's apartment? Not looking for pictures of your mother, that's obvious."

She wrenched her arm away. "Get out of my house." She swiped the plate and his cup off the counter and dumped them in the sink. They rattled like gunshots.

"If you're hiding something, it's only going to make things worse."

"Is that a threat? Are you threatening me?"

"I'm trying to help you!"

"I curse your help, Detective. I curse you. Get out. Get out of my house. Get out!"

He stared at her, mouth pinched white around the edges. Then he threw down his napkin and stalked out of the kitchen. A second later, the front door slammed.

Trembling, she collapsed onto a stool. When the shaking had subsided, she reached for the phone, punched in a four and two ones. When the operator came on, she was quick and blunt.

"Sokanan. The number for Ben Bonner."

***

Outside the front door, Hank ran a weary hand through his hair. That went well.

He trudged to his car, removed the dome light, and got hv Christ, he shouldn't have sprung all that on her. Not this morning.

Okay, so the timing might not have been ideal, but what was the ideal time to confront her lies?

Maybe not the day after she lost someone close to her.

He punched the steering wheel, furious at himself. Fuck it. Fuck him. Fuck the whole damn thing.

How did things go, Henry?
his mother asked in his head.

Swell, Ma. Just swell.

He should go back to the farm, but he couldn't face Rose yet.

Coward.

You got that right.

Instead, he drove into the heart of Sokanan, to the home he hadn't seen in a few days. It sat atop the hill on Webb Street, an aging beauty of a bungalow with enough exterior molding to ice a cake and a sweet little porch that sagged only a bit in the center.

He eyed it from the curb, seeing the details through the dreariness of the exterior. The paint was peeling, the porch steps broken. Poor tiling, it fit right into the rest of the rundown neighborhood. There were blocks and blocks of houses like his, all with great lines and bad posture, ancient beauty queens on the edge of gentrification. He'd bought his for a song, did a hell of a job on the inside, but the outside needed more TLC than he had time for now.
I should have been better to you, sweetheart.
He sighed, strolled up the cracked concrete walk toward the steps. Someone had knocked down the for sale sign in the yard, and he set it upright again.

Mail had piled up on the floor beneath the mail slot. He pushed the envelopes and papers aside with the door, then swooped to pick them all up. Leafing through, he saw most of them were advertising circulars dated a week ago. The important things, bills and a couple of magazines, he kept. The rest he dumped in the trash.

He went into the living room, a snag area at the front of the house that he'd spent much time and money on. He'd re-finished the hardwood floor himself, cleaned up the chair rail and the molding on the windows, pulled out the dry wall that a previous owner had used to cover over a built-in bookcase, and repainted. It was cozy now, filled with comfortable chairs and a small, overstuffed sofa. Leaving it was going to be harder than he thought, which was why he didn't think about it. He shoved that pending loss into the same dark corner he shoved the fiasco of the morning, dropped onto the sofa, and checked the messages on his cell phone. Greenlaw, the uniform who'd done the crime scene at Alex's, had called. And there was one message from Ben.

Thinking it might be about the farm, and feeling guilty he wasn't there, he called Ben back first.

His brother lit into him. "I just heard from A. J. Baker. What the hell do you think you're doing?

Hank paused, taken aback by the vehemence in Ben's voice. "What are you talking about?"

"The future of this entire city depends on her goodwill. If she wanted to, she could have taken this Renaissance deal anywhere. She brought it here, to us, because she's community minded But that won't go far if the community and that means you, little brother alienates her."

Anger pumped through him. That cold bitch. Siccing the mayor on him, "What the hell did she tell you I did?"

"Questioned her. Tried to implicate her in this conven-ience store murder. She just lost her housekeeper, for Crissake. What's wrong with you? Miss Baker has nothing to do with your case. You have a suspect, don't you?"

"We have suspicions. I wouldn't say he's a suspect."

"Well, make him one. Do your job, Hank, and leave Miss Baker alone."

Ben disconnected, and Hank put down his phone, fury subsiding into something else. He knew desperation when he heard it, and Alexandra Jane must have been beyond desperate to call in the troops. He stared out the window, the stained glass he'd restored there bending the light into prisms of pale yellow and lavender. He was getting close. But to what?

Within the last four days, two Russians had turned up dead Two Russians with a clear link to Alex. A fluke? Possibly. Especially if Sonya had died of natural causes.

But in his line of work, coincidence often panned out to be something else entirely.

But what? And what did Alex have to do with it?

Hank sighed and picked up the phone again. Oreenlaw answered on the second ring.

"I got a list of the items we placed in evidence," the patrol officer said. "Thought you'd like to see it."

Between Saturday night and Sunday morning? Crime scene investigation was one way out of patrol, and if Green-law was bucking for detective division, Hank would give him two thumbs up. "Anything stand out?"